


We’ll just have to get creative

by beejones



Category: The Strange Case of Starship Iris (Podcast)
Genre: Dating on board a space ship is hard but these kids are making it work, F/F, Post-S1, creative dating, let violet and arkady be happy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-03
Updated: 2019-07-03
Packaged: 2020-06-03 08:58:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19460692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beejones/pseuds/beejones
Summary: ‘And what does dating even mean when we live together already?’Set after season one. Violet and Arkady’s first official date (/ first time eating a meal with significance <3). Title is a quotation from episode ten.





	We’ll just have to get creative

It was difficult to measure, given that the crew spent so much time together anyway, but Violet liked to count the day Arkady stopped using crutches as the day of their first official date. Sure, there had been a bit of discreet kissing in corners, and some long conversations while they lingered in the common room after dinner. But on the sixth day after leaving New Jupiter Violet had agreed that Arkady could stop using the leg brace and the crutches (which was not to say she should be jumping out of airducts any time soon, Violet emphasized - but with the state of the art medbay, the rate of human healing was significantly faster than normal). 

And then Arkady had asked her on a date. A mysterious, unspecified date. Arkady had proven impervious to questions, slipping out the medbay door with a smile and an instruction to meet in the kitchen at the start of the dinner shift. 

That had been its own nerve-wracking experience; the rest of the crew looking on with interest while they put bread and fruit and water in a bag and found a makeshift tray for two bowls of soup. 

(Krejjh, gleeful: ‘A _date_! Are you going on a picnic? To a concert? For icezzcream?’

Violet, awkward: ‘It’s a surprise.’

Krejjh: ‘The best kind of date! Can I come too?’ 

Arkady, through gritted teeth: ‘ _Krejjh. No._ ’)

Dinner collected, they had left the communal rooms and moved into parts of the ship Violet hadn’t even seen yet. On the level below the main deck long sterile corridors were tucked endlessly into each other like a pressure bandage folded in a first aid kit. The softly-lit halls were clean, quiet, and somehow strongly reminiscent of a horror film. Not ideal first-date material. 

‘You’re not about to murder me in a storage closet, are you?’

Arkady flashed a stammer-inducing smile over her shoulder. ‘We’re nearly there. No panicking, Liu.’ 

She stopped in front of a nondescript grey door and punched in a code. The door slid open, but all Violet could see was a slice of blank wall before Arkady blocked her view. 

‘Hand over the soup. I don’t want you dropping it.’ 

Violet complied silently and Arkady disappeared inside the mysterious room, a quiet clank suggesting that she was putting the tray down. 

When she reappeared she took both of Violet’s hands in her own. ‘Now you have to close your eyes,’ she demanded. 

‘This seems like another strike in the imminent murder column,’ Violet grumbled, but she did as she was told.

She gasped a little when Arkady’s mouth pressed gently against her own. When she spoke, Violet could hear the smile in the other woman’s voice. ‘As if I’d murder someone as cute as you.’ Violet smiled too, eyes still closed. Smiles all around, these last few days. It was strange, but…really, really nice. 

‘Now step carefully. You’ll be mad if I rip my stitches because you’ve fallen on top of me.’ Arkady pulled her forward gently. They were through the doorway now, inside…wherever this was. 

‘I found this when I was doing the security sweep. You would have known what it was straight away, but I had to look it up on the system. Not my usual thing. So remember, Liu, it could have been _weeks_ before we found this place if I’d stayed off my leg like you wanted.’ Arkady’s voice echoed strangely in the new space. 

‘That is a terrible defence, First Officer Patel,’ Violet said dryly. ‘You still disobeyed the doctor’s orders.’ 

‘Shit, think I should be worried about terrible consequences from Dictator Tripathi?’ 

Violet giggled as Arkady gave her a gentle quarter-turn. Arkady’s snark was adorable, now that they were dating. Arkady’s everything was adorable, to be honest. 

‘Okay. You can open your eyes now.’ 

Violet blinked, adjusting to the light. Arkady was standing right in front of her, a grin battling to escape from behind her studiously casual expression. And over Arkady’s shoulder…

Violet’s face slackened in shock. They were in a narrow room, very long - the lights at the other end hadn’t activated, but it would almost have to run the length of the entire ship. Every half metre or so shelves of varying heights pushed out from the righthand wall, leaving only a narrow corridor for walking. They looked like bookshelves, or maybe miniature bunk beds, but Violet knew they weren’t. Even empty, she knew what these were for. 

She looked back at Arkady, speechless. Opened and shut her mouth a few times, making Arkady laugh in delight. Eventually she found her voice, so shrill it was almost a shriek. 

‘You found a _greenhouse_?! A - a ship-sized, aeroponic, actual real-life greenhouse?’

Arkady was diffident. ‘Turns out they’re pretty standard in the J-series ships. Helps keep crew healthy on long-distance missions. Probably better for morale, too, come to think of it.’ 

‘D-does it work?’ Violet asked tentatively.

‘If you mean can we grow stuff, then yeah. It’s fully stocked. I thought maybe we could spread some data pads on the floor while we eat and you can decide what to plant. There are a heap of preset programs, or you can do custom designs pretty easily.’

‘I can decide? Shouldn’t we check with the others first?’

‘Nah.’ Arkady grinned. ‘I spoke to Sana and she said you’re the boss. Violet Liu - biologist, doctor, badass…gardener.’ 

‘But what about you? I mean, I’m a biologist, but you…I know how much plants mean to you.’

Arkady shrugged awkwardly. ‘Doesn’t mean I know anything about them. Whatever you grow - if you’re happy, I’m happy.’ 

Violet studied the other woman in silence. Words seemed so useless in the face of all this… _emotion_. So thick in the air it was almost tangible. She gave up on speaking and pulled Arkady into her arms instead. 

Violet kissed with total abandon, strangely able to be vulnerable physically despite her persistent mental hang-ups. Telling Arkady how she felt was fraught with difficulty anyway, given her tendency to ramble and Arkady’s tendency to hide. So kissing was best, for now. Kissing, and whispering words of praise, and nuzzling the dimple on her left cheek, and reverently tracing the strong muscles of Arkady’s waist and back. 

Arkady had found this place and known how Violet would love it, and turned it into a gift. It could have been purely practical, an unexpected bonus for their isolated little crew. But instead it was a testament to Arkady’s thoughtfulness, her secret tenderness. Proof of her feelings - proof they both knew Violet’s anxious mind always desperately needed. _This woman,_ Violet thought dazedly. 

‘Oh my god, oh my god.’ She pulled back a little, making eye contact. ‘You’re _amazing_. Oh my god, Arkady!’ 

Arkady was still shy, despite her obvious pleasure at Violet’s happiness. She buried it under characteristic gruffness. 

‘Don’t hurt yourself, Liu. You look like you’re about to have a seizure.’ 

‘Shut up, you.’ Violet pressed forward for another smiling kiss, then buried her head in Arkady’s shoulder.

‘Thank you,’ she whispered. ‘This is just…so perfect.’ 

Arkady ran a tentative hand over Violet’s hair. ‘You like it?’ 

Violet let out a strangled laugh. ‘Uh, yeah. I definitely like it. Definitely, definitely… _definitely_ like it.’ 

The soup, set carefully out of the way on a shelf, cooled to a tepid mush that did nothing to improve Brian’s cooking. All the sensor-operated lights flickered out, one by one, until they were left with just the globe above their heads. Eventually Arkady pulled back, a little breathless. 

‘Just promise me there’ll be a mint plant?’

_postscript_

It wasn’t the second official date, or even the seventh, but it was worth the wait. Not that their intervening dates had been bad - they had shared bottles of wine under the stars; cooked dinner together (Arkady surprisingly well, Violet unsurprisingly distracted by Arkady’s very high-cut shorts); shared shifts in the cockpit, talking until well past midnight. Arkady had even agreed to sketch Violet, provided Violet talked about herself the whole time. 

But once Arkady’s leg was fully healed Violet could finally set up the date she’d been waiting for. The one that was specifically designed to make Arkady happy, just like Arkady had arranged the greenhouse date for her. 

‘So what are we doing, Liu? You want to… work out together?’ Arkady stared around the gym, a faintly puzzled expression on her face. 

Violet squared her shoulders. ‘No. I want you to teach me more combat moves, like before we went to New Jupiter.’

‘What?’ Arkady stared. ‘You hated that. You called me a sadist! You said I was making you trip over on purpose. _When I was on the other side of the room_.’

‘Um, yeah.’ Violet shrugged, still a little embarrassed. Coordination had never been her strong point. Even Brian had been better at Arkady’s self-defence classes than Violet, though she liked to think she had improved at least a little. ‘But I know it was really important to you that we could learn to protect ourselves. And I’ve definitely still got a lot to learn.’

‘You don’t have to do this just to make me happy.’ Worry and eagerness warred on Arkady’s face. 

‘I know. But I need a workout, and, well, I like making you happy. And…I’m kinda hoping we have a whole thing where we’re rolling around on the floor wrestling, and then we end up making out.’ She’d actually managed to stun Arkady into silence, Violet noted interestedly. ‘…but, you know, self-defence is the priority. Obviously.’ 


End file.
